


Battle with the Monsters in your mind

by thecat_13145



Series: Monsters [4]
Category: X-Men (Movies), X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-06-13
Updated: 2012-07-22
Packaged: 2017-11-07 16:07:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/432995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thecat_13145/pseuds/thecat_13145
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>X Men First Class if Erik had been a CIA Agent. And a sort of prequel to Sometimes the Monsters fight with you, exploring Logan and Erik's life before the X Men and Avengers</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Old and New Wars

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Sometimes the Monsters fight with you](https://archiveofourown.org/works/407376) by [thecat_13145](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thecat_13145/pseuds/thecat_13145). 



> As I've said this is a prequel to Sometimes Monsters fight with you, so please read that.

_Now ___

It was not normal, even at the Xavier Institute for gifted youngest, to walk in to a kitchen and see metal bands wrapping themselves around a fridge. However Timothy “Dum Dum” Dugan’s only response was a glance at the kitchen’s other inhabitant.

“Take it Dukes got into the fridge again?”

Erik nodded distractedly, still focused on his task. “Charles isn’t entirely sure whether it’s a reaction to what happened, or an eating disorder.”

“Could be both.” Dum Dum observed coolly. Erik didn’t reply, but finished the bands and the lock clicked its self shut.

“I suppose I should have asked if you wanted anything?” He said, turning to greet his guest.

Dum Dum shook his head. “I ate before I came here.”

They’re both avoiding the subject of where he was before he came here, why he’s dressed up to the nines in his best suits, his bowler polished to perfection, the silence in the kitchen too tense given all they’ve been though.

Erik grabbed a cloth and began rubbing at a none existent stain on the counter top.

“Charles wants me to talk to Platt about Nord.” He said, avoiding the other man’s eyes. “Thinks he could have a future” he spat the word out. “In the CIA”

Dum Dum raised an eyebrow. “Thought the prof said it would be at least a year, before any of them were...” He paused, unsure of how to put it.

Erik sighed. “Charles believes that he has done all he can do for Nord. The man is institutionalised and not improving here.” He shrugged. “The CIA would be good for him.”

It sounds like he’s trying to convince himself, which Dum Dum finds embarrassing. He glanced out of the window, across the grounds.

“Good day?” 

Erik shrugged. “There’s been no change. But he has not attacked anyone, so...”

Dum Dum nodded, getting to his feet. “Guess I’ll go see him then.”

“Dum Dum?”

He was nearly at the door before the voice spoke up, nervously, sounding a lot more like the starving teenager Erik had been the first time they met than the former CIA agent turned teacher that he is.

“Logan is going to get better, isn’t he?” it’s almost the same tone that a tired child who wasn’t really a child would ask him if the war would end, if things would be alright.

His response is as automatic now as it was then.

“Course he is.” He glanced at Erik. “Whose been telling you different?”

Erik had shoved his hands into his pockets, the lie of the fabric suggesting that he was toying with that old Nazi coin he always carried with him.

“Charles says we should consider the possibility.”

Dum Dum felt a wave of anger rise in his chest, mostly directed against a telepathic former Oxford professor with only limited experience in the spy field.

“Yeah, I’ve considered it. And it’s not going to happen. Logan is going to be fine.”

He said, forcibly. “Your boyfriend may be very smart, but he doesn’t know everything. And we know Logan.”

He pulled open the door and began to march across the grounds.

/*/*/*/*/*/*/*

_1963 ___

The nightmares pulled him awake with the taste of blood still in his mouth. He shot out of bed and crawled across to the bathroom on his hands and knees. He bent over the toilet, but though his heart felt like it might burst from his chest, his stomach remained under his control.

Erik Lensherr breathed deeply and pulled himself to his feet.

“Quite the little soldier,” he muttered to his mirror, turning on the taps. “Logan would be so proud of you.”

He glanced again at his reflections. There were huge bags under his eyes, reflecting that the night’s events were becoming more normal than he cared to admit.

“What would Dum Dum say?” He muttered.

Actually he knew exactly what Dum Dum would say. He could call Erik a “Crazy Kraut” and drag him off to the nearest bar, until Erik either told him why he wasn’t sleeping or Erik was drunk enough to sleep.

He wished he could find Dum Dum, talk to him. But Dum Dum had his own problems, working to set up something that he couldn’t talk to Erik about.

And Erik was not a scared 13 year old needing comfort. He was a decorated soldier. Owner of a purple heart. A CIA agent.

He snorted. O.K. the last one felt more and more of a joke every day.

Gerard Plat was a kind man, but honestly he was an imbecile. Some days, Erik considered volunteering for a transfer to project Starbright, after this it could only be a step up.

He had no idea what he’d done to end up here (actually, he knew perfectly well, he didn’t have Logan’s talent for lying and Mcdunn was no fool, particularly when it came to explaining exactly what had happened with that barbed wire, but the point was irrelevant), but his patience was running out.

He sighed.

Another month, he reminded himself. That’s how long he would stick it. Then if there was still no word from Logan or any of the others, he would resign and go find them himself, Dum Dum’s warnings about caution be dammed.

He ran his hands though his hair, and splashed some water on his face. He knew he wouldn’t get any more sleep tonight, but he needed to be alert and ready. Plat had sent word that he was coming back tomorrow, bring another couple of crackpots with him.

Erik chuckled to himself. He hoped one of them was female. Watching Hank’s interactions with eh fair sex was always...amusing.

/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*

_Now ___

Originally they had held Logan in the main house, same as the rest of Stryker’s victims.

Two days later and two destroyed rooms, even Charles was forced to admit that they had to reconsider.

The cabin was Erik’s idea.

Charles might claim it had originally been his father’s laboratory, but apparently it didn’t smell like that to Logan.

Or Labs smelt like home, but Dum Dum really didn’t want to wander if that was true. Zero was broken beyond all repair, beyond even Charles’ optimism, and they had lost two already.

The others were more mixed. On good days, he could believe that they were going to be alright, going to live their lives out safely, but on the bad days...he sighed, relieved that Charles was the telepath not Erik. He wouldn’t have let the kid see what was going through his head, not for all the tea in china, as Brian would have said.

He wished he could call the other man, have someone else to share these worries with, someone who he could see as something other than a too thin 16 year old.

What was it that Gabe used to say?

“If wishes were horses, beggars would ride”

He said aloud, relieved that the woods were deserted and knocking on the cabin’s door.

/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/**/

_1963_

Erik had heard of Moria Mactagert. It was a bit hard not to, as she was one of the Bureau’s few female agents. And would be the last if certain elements had their way.

He had heard a great deal about her auburn hair, her figure and her general appearance, most of it in language that would have made Moria blush.

He had also heard about her fixation with Stryker and had even briefly considered sharing his own information with her.

He had quickly changed her mind. Moria had, from what he heard, all the subtle of a tank, and taking down Stryker was an operation that required more planning, more tact than the red head seemed to process.

He’s heard, via the CIA grapevine about her intrusion into Stryker’s home, and while he admires her daring, he thought at the time it was foolish. A man like Shaw will keep nothing and reveal nothing at home, anymore than the Commandants of the camps did.

The other two with her, he doesn’t know. He’s heard of Charles Xavier’s work, mostly though Hank, and knows that the man is viewed as brilliant, but possibly slightly insane by most of those who he works with. A “Men from Mars” man is how he overheard others describing. His recruitment by Platt makes sense.

The other, a blonde woman, he doesn’t know. She could be anything from a KGB spy to lecturer on ESP.

So he remains in the shadows, while Platt introduces them to Hank.

“How wonderful,” Charles steps forward, reaching out to ring Hanks’ hand. “Another mutant. No, “ He paused, shaking his head “two. Who’s this?”

And his eyes fixed exactly on the corner where Erik was hiding. 

“Hank?” Platt glanced at McCoy and then into the shadows. “Erik?”

He sounded more hurt over McCoy, not that Erik could blame him. When a guy arrives at your door with stories of barbed wire attacking people behind him, then the idea that he is a mutant isn’t that hard to swallow.

But Hank... it was only after a lot of watching the other man that Erik had been sure.

Hank muttered something about Platt not asking, looking everywhere but at the others. Erik stepped out of the shadows, but remained silent.

“So your mutant is what? You’re super smart?” The blonde girl asked, stepping forward, looking interested and wasn’t that an interesting development?

“I’ll say.” Platt seemed relieved. Genius as a mutation he could handle. “Hank here graduated Harvard at the age of 15.”

“I wish that’s all.” Hank muttered and Erik didn’t blame him. He only knew about the other part of Hank’s mutation because the bunker became a sauna in the summer heat, driving even the most self conscious person to at least remove shoes and socks.

“You’re among friends,” Xavier was saying, one hand on the young man’s arms. “You can show off.”

Erik watched, curious as Hank removed his shoes and socks, revealing feet that looked like an extended hand. He had seen Hank’s feet before, but he had wondered if they were simply there, like a sixth finger, or whether Hank could actually use them.

Watching the other man jump and hang upside down on top of Blackbird he got his answer.

A cold sick feeling began to unwind in the pit of Erik’s stomach, as he watched the others applaud and laugh. 

He glared at Hank. Did the boy not realise the danger he was in?

Evidently not, as the blonde woman walked forward, staring at Hank’s upside down face. “You’re amazing.” She muttered.

Erik snorted to himself. Women were always useful, particularly when you wanted them to stay calm.

“And you my friend?” The Professor had stepped forward, holding a hand out towards Erik, “What can you do?”

His eyes were friendly enough, but Erik knew better than Hank, better than to trust any government with what they could do.

“Pray you never find out.” He snarled, sweeping out of the room.  
TBC


	2. Strange Hells

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Err Warning I am combining X-Men First Class and X-Men Origin Wolverine?  
> Also unbetaed.

_1963_

Erik swept though the CIA corridors like a whirl wind. 

The few agents he did encounter almost fell over jumping out of his way at the furious expression on his face.

He entered his quarters, slamming the door behind him. It locked without a second thought.

Adrenaline was coursing though his veins, as he dug under his bed, pulling out the old battered duffle bag.

The pens in the pot on his desk were spinning around and the window frames were rattling like a hurricane was coming. Outside in the courtyard, the statue was beginning to inch forward and Hank was jumping around the lab like a lunatic, trying to understand why machines are suddenly switching themselves on.

He didn’t dare fling himself down on the bed because the frame is metal. He tried to be calm, to stop it, but his mind kept jumping around

_They know. Got to get out of here. Got to stop it._

The thoughts were chasing each other around in his head like some demented dog and he was struggling to breath_

There’s a knock on the door, a banging that keeps getting louder.

_Gestapo!_

And that snapped him back. He could almost hear Logan’s voice in his ears admonishing him, reminding him that the Gestapo are gone; have being for nearly twenty years. And that knocking on the door, while persistent is that of a civilian, not someone trying to break down the door.

As the panic receded, he could make out the words been shouted through the doors.

“Erik It’s Charles.”He wanted to snarl at the other man that he has no right to use that name, to talk as though they are friends, but all that comes out is an angry

“Vhat?”

He pulled himself to his feet, and yanked the door open, realising too late that he did so almost entirely with his power. A part of him shrugged. They knew what he was now anyway. It was just a matter of time.

Charles Xavier stood in the open door, looking embarrassed and contrite

“I am so so terrible sorry. I never meant to”

There are agents milling around the corridor and this is really not a conversation that Erik wanted to have where everyone can hear it.

“Get it here.” He hissed, grabbing the professor’s hand and pulling him into the room.

He watched as Xavier moved through the small room with an expression of innocent fascination on his face.

There’s nothing much in here to inspire fascination, it’s just a standard issue room, with a bed, a desk and a worn chair

There used to be a typewriter on the desk, but Erik got rid of it after the first week. The Verndamt thing kept typing of its own accord whenever he had a nightmare.

There’s very little personal in the room. A well worn copy of Frankenstein, a gift from Gabriel Jones, sat on the desk, its spine cracked and pages dog eared. Above it, taped to the walls were two photographs.

The first showed a much younger Erik standing outside the home that had being his family’s in Dumerdolf. It had being taken less than a week after the town was liberated. Logan had just glanced at him and said “This where you’re from kid?” When Eric had nodded, he’d dragged Eric through the town until they found the house. 

Dum Dum had taken the picture, after Logan terrified it’s occupants into letting them in. It was the only photo he had of the house where he had been born and raised.

The second was a photograph of the Howling Commando as the press called them. Erik was in the centre, sitting atop a captured German tank with a helmet three sizes too big for him flung over his head. He was 16, two days shy of 17 and grinning at the world. 

They had just received word that Paris had being liberated, the Nazi war machine forced into retreat. He had being swept up in the jubilation that spread through the lines, the feeling that the end was in sight.

Logan was standing in the bottom right hand corner of the picture, a cigar clamped between his teeth and a grin on his face that Dum Dum said made him look like Patton. Erik, who had met the commander, had never seen the similarities, but there was certainly no chance anyone would think Logan was anything other than the unit’s leader.

Brian Falsworth and Roger Pinkerton stared out from the middle of the picture, perched like a pair of cockatoos in their red berets on the tanks runners.

Jeff Macey, Gabe Jones and Denier were crouched in front of the tank, with Gabe in the middle, which had nearly caused command to have a fit, when they’d seen it, as though the photo’s existence hadn’t being enough reason.

Dum Dum Dugan stood to the left, twirling his bowler hat.

He realised that Xavier was talking.

“...Didn’t mean to. I didn’t know that you hadn’t told them_”

“Does you’re university know?” He snapped out. At the expression of confusion that passed over the other man’s face, he growled out. “You talk like an Oxford man.”

He had met enough of them in the RAF to pick out the subtle accent. It was Oxford or Cambridge and the exact one had being a lucky guess.

Xavier dropped his eyes. “I haven’t told them, no.” He paused and added. “In fact, the CIA are the first people to know what I can do outside of my sister.”

“And what can you do?” Erik asked, curious in spite of himself.

“How about an exchange?” Xavier was smiling, the blue eyes dancing. “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”

Erik considered it and then nodded.

He removed the coin from his pocket. It was the only thing he had taken with him when the Commando’s rescued him from Schimit. To remind himself what had happened, what he was fighting for. It was strange, but that was how it was.

Carefully, he placed the coin on the desk top. He could feel Xavier’s eyes on him as he calmed himself, remembering the tricks he learnt, from Stryker, from Logan and held out a hand.

The coin rose into the air. Erik moved it like a sparkler, spelling out his name then Charles. E R I K L E N S H E R C H A R L E S X A V I E R.

Xavier was staring in fascination. Slowly, Erik lowered the coin back to the desk.

“You can manipulate metal.” 

“I control magnetism.” Erik corrected, because he’d had enough discussions with Roger, with Brian and with Gabe to know this is correct. “If a metal is magnetic, I can manipulate it. I can also,” He moved a hand. “Create a shield from myself of magnetic energy.”

He glanced at Xavier, feeling self conscious. He knew he had being incautious, but it had been too long since he had an opportunity to show off.

“And you?” He turned to face him. “What can you do?”

I’m afraid my mutation isn’t as flashy as yours.  
The voice seemed to come from everywhere and anywhere and at that moment, he glanced at Charles, he realised that this was the real deal. This was what Starbright and all the other projects were looking for.

Telepathy. And one thought ran across his mind.

Xavier glanced at him.

“What’s Cerebo?”

/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*  
 _Present_

Logan was crouched in one corner of the cabin, his knees drawn up under his chin.

He growled when Dum Dum entered, but sounded more of a warning than a threat. 

Dum Dum certainly chose to interpret it as that. 

Carefully, he placed his bowler hat on the table in the middle of the room and dropped down to face Logan. 

“Hey.” He said softly. Logan didn’t reply, though the blue eyes seemed to focus more strongly on Dum Dum. That might have just being wishful thinking.

“I just thought you’d like to know. We buried Victor today.” He shifted, crouching was not good for old knees and this was likely to be a long conversation. “He’s buried in Beechwood, though that took some negotiating, let me tell you. But I didn’t think you’d want him in Albering, not after what our government did.” He swallowed. “It was a nice ceremony. A lot of people turned up, l think you’d have like it. You’d have being proud that so many people remembered him.” he glanced at Logan. The blue eyes were still resting on him. They gave no clue that any of this was making sense to Logan. “I’ll take you there when you’re well. Show you where he’s buried. And Silverfox too.” He smiled “You two looked pretty cosy when we got there.”

It was an exaggeration. Seeing Logan, his head flung back howling like an animal over the woman’s fallen body had definitely been anything but cosy. 

“We did what she wanted. Buried her in Canada, near that cabin that Stryker owned, the one he used...” he shook his head, unable to finish that sentence. “Kinda nice that’s where she wanted to be, even if she knew it wasn’t true.” He shifted again. It was hard talking to someone who wouldn’t (couldn’t) talk back. “The kids are settling well.” He offered. “Don’t tell Erik I said this, but he’s loving it. Guess that kid Summers really gave him a taste for teaching. Well, he should never have being a soldier. Forced to grow up too quick.”

He glanced at Logan.

“You’ve got to snap out of this Logan.” He muttered, desperately. “Chuck is starting to think that what Stryker did broke you and Erik is starting to believe him, but I don’t think you. You’ve never tried to hurt me, or Erik. Never really tried to hurt Charles either, until he tried pushing at your brain.” He sighed. “Just give me something, Logan. Please.”

He was expecting anything. He certainly wasn’t expecting the blue eyes to turn on him and a voice, harsh with disuse to whisper

“Dum Dum.”

Dum Dum grinned. “Yeah. That’s me. Dum Dum Dugan.”

“Dum Dum.” The mutant repeated the words and Dum frowned, realising what they reminded him of. Where he’d heard a voice like that before.

He rose, for once not afraid of his speed spooking Logan, hurrying over to the intercom that was built into the wall.

“Erik, get your boyfriend down here now!”

/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*  
 _1963_

“I call it Cerebo.” Hank kept glancing nervously at Charles and Erik as they walk up through the grounds to the huge golf ball structure. “As in the Spanish for brain”

Erik doesn’t blame him. Hank is nervous enough around Erik at the best of times, and seeing him almost joined at the hip to Charles Xavier has got to make the young mutant nervous.

But he equally couldn’t help how he was feeling towards Xavier.

For the first time in nearly a year, since that last letter in fact, hope was bubbling up through Erik and he would fight for it, as forcibly as he had thought the last time. And Xavier was rapidly becoming his ally, his teammate.

They had being interrupted before he could explain what Cerebo was, what his thoughts were, by a very junior agent called Coulson, who had informed them that Agent Platt wanted to see them both.

Evidently, Platt (or more probably Hank) had had the same idea as Erik. After all, Cerebo theory was sound enough, even if Project Starbirght had never being able to get it to work. But Starbright’s telepaths were suspicious at best. Whatever else Xavier was, he was the real deal. The most powerful telepath that Erik had ever encountered. He could make it work. He had to.

Platt explained about his idea. Using Cerebo to locate other mutants, and using local CIA agents to bring them in. Xavier had sat quietly throughout the whole thing, like he was listening to a student, his eyes resting on Erik. Then he’d spoken.

“No.”

“Excuse me?” Platt looked stunned.

“If a new species is to be discovered, then it should be by its own kind.” He glanced, taking Platt’s suit and tie in. “Not by the government. We find the mutants alone.”

Platt looked like he was about to explode, the first time Erik could remember seeing anything other than amiability on the other man’s face. It was that which made him speak up. 

“If government agents had approached me about this, I would have run a mile in the other direction.”

“And what if I say no?”

Erik nearly laughed at that, because he knew as well as anyone, that without Charles, Cerebo would remain a white elephant, and Platt a laughing stock. Xavier simply shrugged.

“Then good luck getting your machine to work without me.”

Platt looked between the two of them, apparently deciding he was beaten.

“Erik goes with you.”

Charles smiled. “That’s fine.”

Erik gave a curt nod. Platt dismissed them.

Once they were outside the office, in the deserted corridor, Erik turned to face Xavier. “Vhy did you do that?” He asked, his accent becoming stronger in his confusion.

Xavier put his head on one side. “I’ll answer that, if you answer one of mine.” He pressed on, not waiting for Erik’s reply. “It was because you were so against it. You hid it well,” he added, as Erik began to turn, “but honestly the idea of the government knowing about mutants, about your powers, finding other mutants, it terrifies you.”

Erik dropped his head. “Identification, that’s how it starts.” His hand dropped to his arm, fingers running over the letters drawn into his flesh, even though his shirt sleeves hid them. “Then registration. And it ends with being rounded up and experimented on.”

“You can’t believe that. 

Erik let out a bitter bark of laughter. “Why not?”

“You work for the CIA. You’re a decorated soldier.”

Erik shrugged. “If you are useful,” he said, softly. “They leave you for a while.”

Xavier shook his head. “No. That’s not your reason. You don’t believe that, not really. You worry about it, maybe, but it’s not what you believe.”

“Don’t I?”

Xavier shrugged. “You wouldn’t stay if it wasn’t.”

“I have my reasons.”

“So I infer. Which leads me to my question.”” He paused. “When you saw my power, you’re first thought was Cerebro.” He paused. “I suppose my question is, who are you looking for?”

There were moments, Erik knew, where you made a decision, where everything turned on a shoe string. He swallowed. “I want the same thing as Agent Mactagert. To find Stryker. And when I do,” He paused, thinking of Logan’s letters. Of what they had said and possibly more worryingly what they hadn’t said. “I’m going to make sure he can’t hurt anyone again.”

Xavier’s eyes were still resting on him, curiously, even as he distractedly congratulated Hank on his sort of joke (it was funnier than most of Hank’s jokes, so Erik was prepared to count it), like he wanted to ask exactly what Erik had meant by that, who Stryker had hurt already, but couldn’t bring himself to do so.

Erik ignored him, focusing on the absorbing dance that was happening as Hank and the blond woman, (introduced as Raven Darkholme, Charles’s sister) navigated and flirted around each other.

Xavier was forced to break, as Hank guided him to the platform, bemoaning Xavier’s refusal to allow his head to be shaved. Xavier glanced at Erik.

“How do I look?”

“Like an adorable lab rat.”

“Really?” He cursed himself for the adjective, but it was true. However much he denied it, there was something adorably honest about Xavier, even when he was hooked up to one of Hank’s machines.

“I’ve being a lab rat Charles, I know one when I see one.”

He watched the other man smile as Hank fiddled with switches and dials.

Hank glanced nervously at Erik, then at Charles waiting for confirmation. Erik glanced at Charles and nodded his head slowly.

Hank flicked the final switch.

Erik froze as a look of surprise, pain and fear raced across Xavier’s face. Hank was crouched like some mad scientist in a film over by the dials, but as Charles gasped, his eyes and Erik’s met in a moment of terror.

Had Hank got it wrong? Was that why none of the so called telepaths from Starbright had managed to work it?

But then an expression of pure delight flashed across Xavier’s face, and he began to laugh with joy. Hank exclaimed unnecessarily “It’s working.”

/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*  
 _Present_

“Brain damage?” Charles Xavier stared at Major Dugan, who shrugged, looking at Erik.

“We’ve both seen Logan take head shots, heck I’ve seen him have half his brain blown out and be walking around in a couple of hours.”

Erik nodded slowly. “You think the damage is physical, rather than physiological?”

Dum Dum ran a hand though his head, mentally cursing that they hadn’t thought about this before. “Admantium, if the info we’ve got on it is correct, is only workable when it’s liquid. And it’s only liquid at fifteen hundred degrees and even then only for a few minutes.” He shrugged. “The only way the adamantium could have got into Logan’s bones was in its liquid state, and even if we allow a few seconds for cooling, anything which came in contact with his bones would have being burnt.”

Erik began ticking off the organs on his fingers. “Brain, heart, lungs, muscles, tendons…” He shook his head. “My god. It’s a miracle either of them survived it.”

“Victor didn’t.” Dum Dum reminded him. “We assumed it was the admantium that caused his system to shut down, but it could have being anything, with the damage done.”

The three men were silent for a moment, pondering what humans would and could do to each other. And to mutants.

Charles was the first one to speak. “That still doesn’t explain what we’re witnessing.”

Dum Dum managed not to glance at Erik in frustration, but it was a near thing.

“The body prioritises healing, right? Vital stuff first, rest later.”

“I would call the brain fairly vital.” Charles observed, in that cool oxford humour, but Dum Dum had had enough experience with Pinky and Brian, and what felt like a million RAF personnel to ignore it.

“Parts of the brain are. Parts we can’t survive without, but the rest.” He shrugged. “Couldn’t Logan’s body have healed the vital parts of the brain, those to mean he could breathe and so on, and then turned to the rest of the damage? We know it had to be pretty extensive. Stuff like language, memories, that stuff could wait until it was safe.”

Charles nodded slowly. “It makes a degree of sense.” He said, slowly. “But is it even possible? For his brain to heal with the pathways intact?”

Dum Dum laughed. “As I told you the first time we met Charles, we don’t know what is and isn’t possible with Mutants. And with Logan.” He shrugged again. “That goes double.”

**/*/*/*/*/*//**//*/**//*/*/*  
 _1963_

“Eugene Milton Judd” Charles called out, as Hank noted down the co-ordinates.

“No good. In Canada, and the Canadians can be a little territorial.” Erik observed, rubbing his neck. They had being at this for nearly 12 hours, Charles calling out names and any other details he could retrieve from the minds he was viewing, Hank monitoring the equipment and Erik and Raven pouring through maps, telephone directories and anything else that might help them gain a better idea of who they were looking for.

It hadn’t taken long for them to agree on some fairly basic rules. 

The mutants must be within America’s Boundaries, and over 18.

The CIA was no place for children, and mutants weren’t worth starting a war over. That didn’t mean that Hank hadn’t noted down the information they gathered (which Erik planned to destroy as soon as Charles was out of the way), just that they weren’t actively pursuing them.

So far, their list consisted of five names.

Angel Salvadore, 22, a Striper (“exotic dancer, Eric” “Striper”), 32 13 N 110 55 W

Amados Muntz, 25, taxi driver, 31 10 N 37 43 W

Alex Summers, the youngest at 18, currently in the custody of the New York Penitentiary, 40 47 N 37 43 W

Sean Cassidy, 19 (if only just), police cadet, 37 33 N 77 29 W.

He glanced at Charles. The other man was starting to look worn. He was just about to suggest that they took a break, maybe tried again to tomorrow, when Charles froze. His hands flew out to grip at the bar along the edge of the platform, just as they had when they first started it.

He let out a great gasp, and Suddenly Erik felt like a tidal wave was rushing through his head. Pain and strange smells. Words hit him with the force of grenades.

_Not Animal. Human._

_LOGAN!_


End file.
